In law, being family friendly is good business

Visit any law school in Canada and you will be left with the false impression that law has become a women’s world. Most Canadian law schools now have significantly more female than male students; At the University of Ottawa, fully 60 per cent of law school graduates are women, and that has been the case for a decade.

But once those promising young grads pass the bar exam and begin looking for careers, about the same time they are thinking about having children if they plan to, reality comes crashing in. Women may make up more than 50 per cent of graduating lawyers, on average, but after law school, the tables turn: Just 37 per cent of lawyers, and 28 per cent of those in private practice, are female.

Law firmly remains a man’s world and, even then, men (and women) who hope to reach the top of the profession must have an understanding spouse or little hope of an outside life.

Why? Because, in busy law firms where earnings are based on billable hours, there is little room for a family life, or any kind of work-life balance — the hours are punishing and the demands are impossible. Within sight of the golden ring, many women choose life balance, more specifically children, over the all-or-nothing that such a career demands.

The high dropout rate of female lawyers has been a growing concern for more than a decade — if you know a female lawyer she will be able to recite a list of women she graduated with who are no longer practising. Those who do both, pay a price. I remember one busy criminal lawyer being presented with a mahogany cradle (to match her desk) from colleagues before she had her first child.

But things are changing. Now, prodded by the Law Society of Upper Canada, the profession has tuned in to the problem and has come up with some solutions.

More than 50 Ontario law firms have signed a commitment to accommodate women, including written policies for maternity leave, and flex- and part-time work for women. The Law Society of Upper Canada is also working on grants for $3,000 to help sole practitioners pay overhead fees while on maternity leave.

It’s only fair. Women should not be penalized for trying to balance a career and a family, nor should men who are trying to do the same.

But the interesting part about the family friendly mood of the legal profession, is that it has more to do with good business than doing the right thing.

And there is a lesson there.

So-called work-life balance has been talked about and studied for years. Linda Duxbury of Carleton University’s Sprott School of Business, is a leading researcher in the field. She warns that work-life imbalance, marked by long hours and inflexible workplaces, causes people to delay having children or to have fewer children, and that will spell disaster for the economy in the long run.

Even U.S. First Lady Michelle Obama is on the work-life balance bandwagon, according to a recent Maclean’s magazine article. The Harvard-trained lawyer, who no doubt has first-hand experience with the issue, is helping move it onto the U.S. agenda.

“As president, Barack is determined to change Washington so that instead of just talking about family values, we actually have policies that make it easier for working parents to provide the support they need to survive and thrive — and policies to ensure that working women never have to make that choice again, between their kids and their careers.” Macleans notes that, to some, her agenda is “downright radical ... perhaps a step toward European-style ‘socialism’.”

It’s funny what Americans consider “European-style socialism.” High on her list of changes that would make U.S. workplaces more family-friendly is paid sick leave.

By those standards, Canada is certainly well into the European-style socialism territory, with our year of maternity leave. But that isn’t an option for sole practitioner lawyers or those employed in big firms, many of which have never had policies for for filling in when women are gone.

But, while work-life balance seems fair and right and makes good policy sense, it also makes good business sense, and that explains why the legal profession has finally begun to take action.

It’s not rocket science, says Bruce Feldthusen, dean of the common law section of the University of Ottawa faculty of law: “Anybody who gets into law school these days has tremendous potential, they have to be very strong ... to have them drop out because there is no room in the profession to accommodate them is a terrible loss for the firms and for society.” Routinely driving some of the top graduates out of law weakens the profession and society.

You do the math. If up to 60 per cent of law graduates are women and only one-third of practising lawyers are, there is a huge loss of potential. That can’t be good for any of us.

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